Chapter 2: Yes, Yes It Is
...E-Rantel...
"Yeaaahhh!" Vorig shouted as he bumrushed the ranger girl, and promptly found himself eating dirt as she adroitly avoided him and kicked his foot out from under his body, sending him tumbling to the ground.
"Hey Rocknuts, if you think you're going to find victory down there, you're wrong." Tifa said as she tapped her dagger on her shoulder.
Vorig got up and punched the ground as he rose, turned around, and came at her the same way, but this time, when she tried that trick, he jumped over her foot and brought his sword around at head height, she ducked, and hit him in the guts in mid spin... only for him to bring his head down on hers as he doubled over, and send them both staggering back.
"Nice thing about being bigger than you, head butts." He gasped as they staggered apart.
"Fair enough, but remember I'm closer to those by being shorter, and I will smack em." Tifa pointed her dagger down below his waist.
Vorig grunted, "Yeah I noticed that the first twenty times, damn woman, just because you're a washboard doesn't mean you can't get laid... ok it'll be by lolicons but still..." He teased, and she came at him again, this time stopping her strike and using his free hand he grabbed her shoulder and pulled her forward, spinning her behind him and kicking her in the ass so that 'she' ate dirt that time.
"How's victory taste?" He said out loud as he stood behind her while she sprawled out on her stomach, "Like fresh air, not dirt." He tapped his practice sword on the dirt behind her.
"Oh you're going to get it now..." She said as she got up and turned around...
A few days later Vorig was venturing into the copper plate dungeon again.
The skeleton came at him, and he kicked it, hard, and as it staggered back, he rushed in and struck off its head, sending it crumpling to the ground. "Should have done that last time."
"Live and learn." Tifa remarked, her hazel eyes danced in amusement as the big young human grinned like the cat who swallowed the canary.
They went deeper within, and Vorig froze when he saw the first blue robed undead. "Relax, those are just observers, that means we're going to see 'dangerous' situations soon." Tifa remarked calmly, and his heartbeat slowly returned to normal.
"Do we ever fight these things?" He asked with widening eyes.
"No, not the blue robed ones, they're there to reset scenarios, and to heal us if we're injured." She took the bow off her back and knocked an arrow. If you attack one, it will restrain you and you'll automatically fail the dungeon. Do it too often, and you'll face penalties from the guild. So don't make a habit of it." Tifa informed him as they came to a wooden door.
"Wait, let me do this part." She said, and began to feel it for traps.
"Don't you know this dungeon well by now?" Vorig asked hesitantly.
She shook her head, "No, it's magic modulation, they change the paths every day, if you ran it twice on the same day, or a dozen on the same day, you could learn it. But the next day? It'd be entirely new."
"Amazing." He said with awe as she let out a sigh of relief.
"Found it." She said, and snipped a very tiny wire catch that blended in almost perfectly with the wood.
"Poison trap." She said without needing to know he was curious about what she found.
"They'd poison us?" He asked with a hard swallow.
"Nothing lethal, just knock us out, and we'd fail the dungeon. Get dragged back into the guild hall and set at a table and people would mock us all to hell for it. The guild maidens would probably sell markers to let people draw shit on our faces."
"Ah... yes. Please look for traps very carefully." He said as he all but died of embarrassment just thinking about it, looking around nervously as if he might spot traps on his own.
"Yeah yeah, sometimes you're the marker, sometimes your the marked, better ink than blood, now shut up and let's go in." She said brusquely. "Open the door." She said and stepped back, drawing her bow. And preparing an arrow.
He stood square in the center and reached for the handle.
"Not that way, idiot, stand to one side, unless you 'want' to get an arrow up your ass." Tifa groused at him, and he blushed as he moved aside, grabbed the handle, and counted to three, then shoved it open firmly.
She put an arrow into a zombie's eye and nocked another arrow before it hit the ground.
"Go!" She said, and he rushed into the room with his sword out and slammed into a short, bearlike monster, his sword went straight through its guts and he kept moving, driving its body back and into another behind it.
He drew his sword as Tifa rushed into the room and took a corner position and started to pin down another with arrows, while Vorig avoided the swing of a club and stabbed the beast in the leg. It grabbed his hair and yanked him to the side, costing him his grip on the sword and sent him directly into the path of Tifa's next arrow, where it hit him square in the thigh... a horn blared, and the monsters stopped moving.
Vorig clutched at his thigh and sucked in his teeth.
Tifa approached as the blue robed lich came down the hall and offered out a healing potion.
Vorig rolled on the ground as she took it and dumped it over his body after yanking the arrow out.
"You bitch, you shot me." He swore.
"Ah, no, you practically dove in front of my arrow, you twit. I swear, just because your nuts are stone doesn't mean your leg is." She smacked him in the side of the head as he slowly got to his feet when the potion took effect.
The lich reached out and opened up its flesh tattered hand, in it there were two wooden tokens.
"What are these...?" Vorig asked as she casually took them.
"Oh right, you didn't get one last time because you didn't make it past the first skeleton." She looked at him archly and held the two tokens out, they were simple finger length, flat wooden sticks with an image carved in them. That of mugs.
"They're brew sticks, basically if you get actually 'wounded' in here... you at least get a free beer out of it for trying." Tifa explained and, looking at both of them with longing for a moment, she reluctantly extended one out to Vorig, who snatched it with annoyance.
"I can't believe you shot me." He groused.
"Don't blame me, you're the twit that let the bugbear thing grab you by the hair like that, I swear, if you really want to be held like that, hire a woman... or man, or whatever you're into and do it in one of 'those' places." She put her hands on her hips and glared at him again, "If you want to go on adventures, keep your hair short like mine so that isn't a problem anymore."
"But... I like my hair." He said and ran his hands through the long straight brown strands.
"And do you like... arrows in your legs, because 'that' is how you get arrows in your legs." She said sharply.
"Fine, beer first, then cut it. And you know, just... as 'much' as I love your relentless mockery, I think I need more of it... so... just for the hell of it, while I'm doing that, why don't you find us a magic user or something so we don't have to rely on just your stick tosser for distance combat." Vorig said, glaring down at the bow she held in her hand still.
She blinked, "Did... did you just call a half elve's bow a 'stick tosser'?"
"Yes, I did, now come on and let's get that drink, if you want to hit me in the nuts again over it, well at least let me get the beer first. I swear, I think you only do that because it's the only way you can get nuts without them belonging to a fetishist."
He laughed as it was 'her' turn to blush and walked out leaving her standing there fuming for a moment before she came back to her senses and chased after him, leaving the pop monsters to just stare blankly at her.
"What are you looking at?" She asked them pointlessly as she stormed out.
Minutes later they drank beers from maroon stained 'freebie' wooden mugs and then got a few more freebies from other adventurers who, recognizing the blood mugs, asked what happened.
"Yeah, my bitch partner shot me." Was followed quickly by...
"My idiot partner dove in front of my arrow."
The stories ended up getting them both a few more beer vouchers out of the ones who either wanted to learn, or wanted a cheap laugh at their expense, and before long, both of them had enough to get thoroughly drunk.
"I'm sure I don't have to say this, Vorig, but 'before' we get drunk, we should take care of what we need to." Tifa looked at him with her hazel eyes as serious as when she first appraised him.
"Yeah, you're right, you don't have to say it. But the thing is, how do we even find someone else to work with? You're an iron plate, I'm a copper plate, and for that matter, I haven't earned either tokens for here or money for anything else. I'm going to run out of the money I brought with me, fairly soon. Then what?"
"Well, there are the newbrooms, for novices who still dive in front of arrows..." She looked at him archly, "there are common rooms that cost only labor, you do some work around the guild for an hour a day for room, and another hour a day for simple food, and another hour per day if you're going to need food or simple equipment repairs. It means you can get by without earning money, at least for awhile until you can start doing dungeon runs for tokens and taking jobs for coin."
"Wow! That is... smart." Vorig said, truly impressed.
"His Majesty thought of everything, he's a true genius who understands the needs and challenges of adventurers. I guess he learned a lot from listening to Lord Momon." Tifa remarked as she held up another voucher and finished her first beer.
"Must be, even I've heard of him, the gifted dark warrior who became the King's enforcer, hostage, and one of his closest advisors... have you ever seen him? I've heard he lives here in E-Rantel, and got his start in this very guild." Vorig's voice became eager, even urgent as he leaned forward to learn more about his idol.
She nodded, "Oh yeah, he still comes here sometimes, and does a dungeon run. He's even escorted some newb adventurers through to kind of... show em how it's done. Alright, you go ahead go shave off that ridiculous mop you're so proud of, and meet me back here, I'll see if I can find some magic for us.
An hour later Vorig was rubbing the back of his now almost entirely bald head and walking back into the guild hall, only the width of a finger now sprang from his skull.
"...So he's not a bad looking kid, really long beautiful brown hair, balls of solid rock, guts, but naive as all fuck..." He heard Tifa say as he walked up behind where she sat across from a dark elf wearing a heavy looking brown robe.
He promptly smacked Tifa across the back of her head. "Yeah, that 'was' one of my best features." He said and she rubbed the back of her skull where he'd lightly smacked it, and her jaw dropped as she saw the close cropped hair atop his skull.
"Whatever, baldy, now sit down and shut up, this is Nazik, a magic caster specializing in destruction." She said and pointed to a chair.
Grumbling, Vorig sat down, "So, what's your tier?"
His voice was sonorous and even, reminding Vorig of tranquil waters from a creek near his home village. "I can cast second tier magic, but was blessed with a talent that allows me to trade one of my senses to cast one tier higher for a day. For example... if the two of you stay as dirty as you are, I would every day trade away my sense of smell, to let me cast third tier magic." His coal black eyes twinkled a little and he looked thoroughly pleased with his own sense of humor.
Vorig and Tifa sniffed themselves. "Must be you, I'm fine." They said in unison, then added a bit shame-faced... "I'll head to the baths after this."
"You've been together for awhile I take it?" Nazik asked curiously.
"No, just a few weeks. Since the first time she kicked me in the balls." Vorig remarked.
"Well, you called me flat." Tifa folded her arms in front of her chest and looked away grumbling, "I'm only seventy two... still growing you know... they will get bigger..."
"Uh huh." Vorig folded his arms and looked in the opposite direction as he groused, "So will my balls if you kick them, that's not a good thing."
Nazik looked at them blankly, from one to the next. "I... see, well from the way you spoke to one another, I assumed you were a couple."
Vorig and Tifa slapped their hands down on the table and stood up at the same moment, "I may be a virgin but if I were that desperate I'd just poke a hole in a damn wall, it'd feel the same way!" Vorig snapped.
"Like I'd ever bang this lolicon perv that can't keep his eyes or his brains off my chest!" Tifa snapped.
Nazik laughed as the two glared at one another and sat back down.
"Down to business..." Tifa said as the two sighed, "We don't have a team that can get through this dungeon, rocknuts here," she jerked her thumb at Vorig, "is right for a heavy position but doesn't have the gear, he can't get the gear without tokens, we can't get the tokens until he gets through it, and we're not getting through it as a pair, we need a magic caster to complete the run, are you in or not?"
Nazik touched the copper plate that hung from his chest. "Yes, but... you're an iron plate, didn't you have a team?"
Tifa looked away. "I did."
"And..." Nazik began to ask.
"They're dead." Tifa said succinctly.
Vorig's face went pale as he looked over at her.
"Old theocracy territory, a few months ago, we were tracking down a group of breakers turned bandits. They ambushed us at night. We got them... and by 'we got them' I mean we managed to kill them, but my team was killed off in the process." Tifa shut her eyes tightly and her hands shook on the table.
"I-I'm sorry." Vorig said sadly, reaching out, he covered her hands with his big, meaty fingers. "I didn't think..."
Tifa shook her head, "Not your fault, don't worry about it, I warned them we needed more training and better equipment, but Lyfa wouldn't hear of it. She and I have the same issues with the Theocracy so she wanted the job."
Vorig froze and did a double take as he, for the first time, considered the implications of her half elven ears and the mention of issues with the Theocracy.
"We got them, that's enough." She wiped her eyes fiercely for a moment and shook off his hand. "I figure this time... we start off with the basics, we'll run through these dungeons until we're all decked out, and 'then' we'll get started taking quests, maybe earn money part time as porters for a more senior team to learn the ropes while still getting some field time in. That way... I won't lose another team."
The table was quiet as they let her words sink in. Nazik finally broke the stillness and said, "Alright, I'm in. Let's go."
He stood up decisively, and with more gravity than he'd seen in her, Tifa rose and took up her bow that she'd laid beside her.
Twenty minutes later...
"Ice!" Nazik shouted, and the floor under a group of six bugbears went white and slick, they tumbled over, and Vorig jumped the short distance and stabbed down, killing three in quick succession while Tifa's arrows found the eyes of three more.
"That is... very useful." Vorig remarked as he turned to approach the door beyond the ice and promptly slipped, falling on his ass with a resounding thud.
"Next time let him dispel the magic first... idiot." Tifa said sarcastically.
Vorig rubbed the back of his head sheepishly and stood up as the ice faded away when it was dispelled. He then rubbed his ass, "That'll leave a bruise."
The blue robed lich in the corner hadn't moved, and so they moved further down the hall. The lights flickered as they took their positions, Tifa front left to scout for traps, Vorig with his sword out, back right to allow her to fall back behind him quickly, and Nazik in the rear.
Tifa caught two traps, one for darts triggered by a pressure plate, one for gas triggered by a tripwire, each one was expertly disabled, and each one instead 'rewarded' them with a copper token.
Finally, they came to a worn wooden door, she listened carefully and heard the sounds of movement within, Vorig took position, and the door flew open inward as they stormed it. Tifa sent two arrows into the first monster she saw, a pop goblin, only for her arrow to bounce off the shield bearing skeleton beside it.
Vorig charged the skeleton, bashing his shoulder into the shield and raising his sword to stop the first blow, he pushed it back to the corner, parried the high blow, and knocked its head off, whereupon it crumpled to the ground in a heap. Nazik used a low tier 'shock' spell on the pop goblin caster, and it crumpled to the ground on the other side of the room.
After it died, and the room was empty, a treasure chest phased into view. "Reward." A watching lich said from its observational corner.
Tifa slung her bow and with a big smile on her face that was a relief to Vorig to see, she approached and casually flipped it up. She looked down, reached in, and pulled out an item.
"Guess this is for you?" She said, and tossed a heavy shield over to Vorig, who caught it with a heavy 'oof' sound.
"Heavy, no good for me, and he's a magic caster sooo..." She shrugged, "Take it, you needed one anyway."
"What do I do with it?" Vorig asked as he looked down in awe at his first true reward.
She jabbed her finger into it as she spoke with a voice so full and rich with sarcasm that it could be drizzled over hotcakes. "You know how pointy things go through flesh? That keeps them out, and blood inside the body where it belongs."
Vorig's face flushed, and Nazik laughed as he went through the pockets of the fallen pop monster and pulled out a small ring.
"Not what I meant, idiot, I mean I... can keep this, sell it, what?" He asked.
"Yes to both, no runes on it, so it isn't restricted, it's just a cheap heavy practice shield, get used to the weight of this thing, and the later ones you'll get will be even easier to use. You could sell it, but they'll take a dim view of that back at the guild, it's better to turn it back in when you get better gear. She traced her hand over it, "See how it's got little dings? This is used, it means someone advanced to a better rank and better gear, and turned this into the guild. Then someone from the guild put it down here for someone else who will need it, keeps reward costs low and lets the guild put more into better facilities, food, and even better rewards." Tifa looked at him doubtfully. "It is 'yours' though. Do what you want."
He felt both Nazik and Tifa looking at him with questioning eyes, and somehow, as he looked down at the shield, it felt as if it was looking back at him. 'Why do I feel like I'm being tested here?' He thought to himself, "I think I'll keep it, I need a shield, and this one was obviously good enough for its last owner, if it survives my use, I'll turn it over to the guild when we move up."
"Good." Nazik said as he put on the ring he'd found. A faint smile on his face, "I got a mana regenerator base level one ring, should let me cast an extra spell or two at least."
"It's a start." Vorig said as he put the shield on his arm and headed for the door.
"Yup, all we've got left for this part of the dungeon is the boss monster, a bugbear chief and his bodyguards, and then we'll be iron rank and, I assume we're all on board with registering as an official team?" Tifa asked, a tiny hint of something other than the cocky tone Vorig was familiar with, crept into her voice.
Nazik and Vorig nodded, and the young farmboy turned adventurer spoke up, "Yup," he said as they took positions in the hall and advanced on the last door, "and I even know what we'll call ourselves, since finishing this on our first team run should make us eligible for the iron plate test."
"Dare I ask?" Nazik's voice carried from the rear.
"You do, you definitely do. Team Ironballs." Vorig grinned, and Tifa looked over her shoulder.
"I like it." She said, with a broad grin as she came close to the door and began to check it over for traps. "Now get in position, you're going to take point and we'll follow, the entrance is where we'll funnel them, and after that, fuck it, who knows? Don't fucking jump in front of my arrows or his spells, and we'll be fine."
Vorig and Nazik gave confident nods.
"Alright," Vorig said as he braced himself and his muscles tensed, "Let's get going, Team Ironballs."
The door swung open, their war cries went up, and Team Ironballs got started.